"Brilliant, you're awake," John heard. The fact that Sherlock had woken him up was being completely ignored. It was difficult to sleep when someone was leaning over him repeating "John, wake up" in his ear.
"God, what time is it?" John groaned, rolling onto his back. Sherlock immediately propped one arm on John's chest, resting some of his weight there and John rubbed his eyes.
Personal space? What personal space?
He became aware that something was being held up to his face for inspection.
"Seven ten."
"What?"
"It's ten minutes past seven in the morning, John. You did ask."
John managed to pluck the paper from Sherlock's right hand, not at all expecting the weight on his chest to be removed. He was right – it wasn't. And Sherlock snuggled against him, now also propping his chin on John's bare chest and watching him. It looked like an extremely uncomfortable position and it was starting to get there for John, but he ignored this because he knew any protests he gave would go unheard.
"What is this?" he groaned.
"Another letter," Sherlock replied with a grin that was far, far too bright for both the hour and the circumstances.
"The post came this early?" John asked.
"Courier," Sherlock replied. His expression was positively gleeful and John wasn't certain if this was a bad thing or not. He kept a sigh to himself, knowing arguing was useless anyway. It certainly wasn't going to change Sherlock's attitude and given that John had demanded Sherlock take this case, he really should be grateful at the enthusiasm.
It was misplaced enthusiasm – or it would be, for someone who wasn't Sherlock Holmes.
John ran his free hand into the dark curls. He didn't want Sherlock to change anyway, not really. This was what made him him.
And the fairly consistent one track mind, John thought as Sherlock placed light kisses on John's chest while the doctor read the letter.
"Do you want me to try and puzzle this out?" John asked. "Or do you want my brain to short circuit?"
"It's so easy," Sherlock replied, voice slightly muffled by the fact that he had not raised his head from John's chest. He followed his words with another light kiss.
John sighed.
"Yes, for you. And I just woke up. And you're a bit distracting."
Sherlock shrugged – which John felt certain he shouldn't be able to do, propped on his arms as he was – and nuzzled John's skin lightly.
"You're on a case, Sherlock," John reminded him. "You don't shag while you're working."
Admittedly that rule had been broken before, but not often – usually only if Sherlock was stuck up against something particularly difficult and needed to stop and refocus himself. John felt a little bit proud that he sometimes replaced the violin playing.
"We haven't got our guns," Sherlock replied. "So we're not properly on the case yet."
John rolled his eyes. That was certainly a very liberal loophole, especially since they had the evidence in their hotel room, spread out on the coffee table, and John was holding another of the morbid letters in one hand. Sherlock was very creative when it came to his mental blind spot for John and often surprised the doctor with how he could bend and shape it to suit his needs.
"You taste different here," Sherlock commented, resuming the light kissing.
"Sorry, what? How can I possibly taste different?"
He felt his husband's tongue run gently across his chest and tried to repress a shudder but the faint chuckle told him he'd failed.
"Different water, different soap," Sherlock murmured, alternating between kisses and licks.
"Really, Sherlock, do you want me to read this or not?"
"Oh, fine," Sherlock huffed and stopped but did not, John noticed, move his lips from John's skin.
John was able to refocus on the letter, such as it was. Same purple pencil crayon as the last one and he wondered if the colours meant anything, but probably not. Sherlock would have picked up on that and commented on it by now if they did. Maybe whoever was writing this just happened to like purple right now.
He sighed at the message.
A childish drawing of two houses, a light bulb, the sun, the "&" symbol, the word "the" and the sun again.
"Bit wordy for him, isn't it?"
"Not really," Sherlock replied with a muffled voice. John combed his fingers through his husband's dark curls and reread the message – or at least looked at it again. He tried to puzzle it out, but his brain was still waking up and partly focused on the feel of Sherlock's lips on his skin and – hmm – the hand that had moved and was now oh-so-not-really-absently caressing his leg.
He was pretty sure Sherlock wanted to explain this one to him. The detective probably thought this one was exceptionally clever and wanted to display his massive intellect – although John wondered how quickly Inspector Anderson would have pieced this together. She'd deciphered the first letter Sherlock had received in very short order.
He tried to concentrate but it was getting harder with Sherlock's fingertips skimming up the inside of his thigh then down the back to his knee.
"Do you want to me to read the letter or do you want to shag?" John growled, his voice deeper than he'd intended it to be.
"Yes," Sherlock replied.
John rolled his eyes. He'd walked right into that one.
"Houses, light bulb, sun, and the sun."
Sherlock raised his eyes now, giving John an amused look.
"Very literal interpretation, my dear Watson."
"Would you stop with the 'my dear Watson'?" John huffed.
"No."
Sherlock gave him a grin and John rolled his eyes again. Those long fingers were continuing their maddening path up and down, just short of moving too far north so that he was routinely distracted by silently urging them to move further.
"Not 'houses'," Sherlock said.
"Yes, they're houses," John contradicted. "Two squares, each topped with a triangle and square windows and a door and even a chimney with a little swirly squiggly line for smoke. What kid doesn't draw houses like that?"
"I didn't," Sherlock said.
"That's because you grew up in a huge bloody mansion. And you were probably drawing grisly crime scenes when you were three."
"Six," Sherlock corrected with a grin and John smacked him lightly on the head with the letter.
"And what's this light bulb?"
"No, John, what does a light bulb use?"
"Electricity," John said.
Sherlock cocked an eyebrow at him.
"Power?"
"Oh, come on. I'm staring it right in the face." Sherlock grinned at his last words, eyes fixed on John.
"What, me? I do not power light bulbs."
Sherlock raised his other eyebrow, looking at him expectantly.
"Come on, John! I said it just a moment ago!"
"What –" John started then sighed, watching Sherlock watch him. He thought a moment, then felt his eyes widen in realization and looked back at the paper, trying to ignore Sherlock's chuckle that he felt reverberating through his body and settling inconveniently in his groin.
It really wasn't helping now that both of them had slept naked.
"Watt sun?" he asked. "Watson?"
Sherlock gave him a triumphant smile. John groaned, covering his eyes with the letter for a moment.
"Holmes and Watson?" he asked. "Oh yes, very funny. He's a regular comedian, isn't he? Ha bloody ha. What's the last one, then? And the sun? I don't understand that one."
"The masculine German article for 'the' is 'der', John."
John paused a moment.
"Anderson?" he sighed.
"Mm-hmm."
"Oh, well, bloody congratulations to him for knowing our names. Of course he knows our names. Does he think we don't? Why would he even bother sending this? Of course he knows we're on the case – he sent you and Inspector Anderson each a letter."
"It's quite obvious that he knows who we are and I'm certain he's not suggesting we don't know our own names. The fact that he drew attention to the three of us implies that he wants us to pay attention to names. Since this case is not about us but about James Murray and his missing daughter, it's reasonable to conclude the name on which he wants us to focus is 'Murray'."
"Well, that should be a no brainer," John said. "But why?"
"I don't know. Perhaps it has significance to a location here in the city."
"Murray?" John asked. "That's a common last name. There's probably hundreds of places and businesses with that in their name."
"Oh, undoubtedly. This is clearly not enough information from which to draw any further conclusions. I did tell you this would be entirely at his whim – rather the whims of the person who is employing him."
John sighed. He knew that, but it didn't mean he liked it.
"Well, fine," he said. "At least we can go down to St. Leonard's and get our guns and show this to Anderson."
Sherlock gave him another smile, this one significantly more predatory. John noted with sudden clarity that Sherlock's hand was moving a lot farther up his leg, but very slowly.
"It's only twenty past seven, John. And if we're late, they'll wait."
"Kipling said nine sharp," John protested.
"Hmm," Sherlock said, kissing John's chest again. "This is not the army. And if they protest, I'll simply have Mycroft get back in touch with them again."
"Are you actually saying this isn't as interesting to you?" John said, waving the letter vaguely.
"I deciphered it in less than half a minute and you've worked it out as well. Until we can confer with Anderson and until we receive a new letter, nothing else can be done that has not already been attempted – by Mycroft, Anderson and myself – over the past nine years. This will be much more pleasurable, believe me."
John thought a little longingly of breakfast but decided – quite abruptly – that this could also wait.
Sherlock left explicit instructions with the front desk clerk that he was to be called immediately should another letter arrive for him by either courier or in the post. He impressed this upon her quite clearly and was moderately annoyed when John dragged him away, saying that she understood him just fine. He had his suspicions that the young woman at the desk was far more invested in one of the concierges and was likely to be distracted by this. She was very obviously paying more attention than the young man than she was to Sherlock, even when the detective was speaking to her. That kind of inattention was uncalled for and made him despair. Or it would have, if it had not been for John, who always made him feel better about the entirety of the human race. Surely if humanity could produce someone as fascinating as John Watson, then there was some hope.
They arrived at St. Leonard's closer to nine-thirty and found Anderson waiting for them, arms crossed, cocking a gold-red eyebrow impatiently.
"Kipling's about to climb the walls," she said, which Sherlock found unlikely. The man did not strike Sherlock as a climber. Nor were the walls here actually conducive to climbing. He ascribed this to some ridiculous maxim.
"Unavoidably delayed," he said and had the distinct expression that John was repressing a snort. Sherlock ignored the temptation to give him a pointed look, because he did not want Anderson interpreting it. But John had enjoyed himself. Sherlock had made sure of this.
He handed her the letter and she took it with a frown.
"Came this morning, via courier," Sherlock said as they strode into the station. The inspector was barely watching where she was going, which meant she was used to the route and accustomed to having something to read or examine while walking.
She too understood the Holmes and Watson but Sherlock had to explain "Anderson" to her and she raised her eyebrows with a sigh.
"Ten years of saying the same thing and you show up and he's all talkative," she commented, a trace of frustration in her voice, on her features.
"Not so," Sherlock replied. "I've looked into this case before."
"But you've never received any letters," she pointed out. "And as soon as you do, they deviate from the pattern. I don't like it."
"Would you prefer that they didn't? Because that would give us no new information."
She sighed and gave him a look then slid her green eyes to John as though to ask if Sherlock was always like this. Sherlock ignored that exchange; his behaviour was irrelevant to the case.
"Well, come upstairs," she said. "Kipling's going to double the paperwork because you're late, you can be sure about that. He's not happy with your brother right now, Mister Holmes."
"I am rarely happy with Mycroft, so this is not surprising," Sherlock replied and her lips twitched. Some sibling rivalry in her own life? Or an understanding of it from her daughters? He suspected the former, since she would probably be displeased with rivalry between her daughters, the way Sibyl Holmes was with the rivalry between her sons. But then, Anderson's own sibling rivalry was unlikely to be similar to what Sherlock had with Mycroft.
There was no sibling quite like Mycroft.
She passed the letter back.
"You shouldn't have been handling that without gloves," she said.
"There's nothing on it," Sherlock assured her.
"I know," she replied, casting him a quick glance over her shoulder as she hit the button for the lift. "But still."
Sherlock just shrugged, unconcerned, and tucked the letter back into his pocket. Anderson took them to Kipling's office, and Sherlock was pleased to see two new handguns waiting for them.
"You're late," Kipling said by way of greeting and Sherlock sniffed – didn't the man have any manners? Sherlock and John were not being paid, they were doing this as a favour, and timetables were for other people to keep.
"Traffic," he lied, just to keep his hand in. Kipling snorted and seemed to buy it and thankfully John did not give up their game.
Neither Kipling nor Anderson had been lying about the paperwork, although Sherlock strongly suspected a good deal of the forms had been entirely made up. He had his passport examined and so did John – and to think John had claimed they didn't need their passports for a weekend trip to Scotland – as well as every other piece of identification they had on them. Kipling even glared at their notes as if looking for counterfeit.
Sherlock signed everything that was put in front of him, after reading it thoroughly, of course. One never knew, with Mycroft. Anderson stood leaning against a filing cabinet, arms folded, a wry but amused expression on her face. Sherlock found himself liking her; she was such a refreshing change from the Anderson he knew.
Finally, they seemed to have satisfied the Chief Inspector – or, more likely, to have run out of things he had put together for them to sign – and their passports apparently met with his approval, because he passed off each weapon with a long winded but strict speech about proper protocol and use and care.
As if Sherlock didn't know.
And John had been in the army.
John was turning his over, examining it carefully. It was unloaded, of course, which was good, and they were given a small supply of ammunition that Sherlock had every intention of augmenting as soon as he was free of either officer. He knew some people in Edinburgh who could assist with that.
"These aren't what I'm used to," John said. "Standard for your force?"
"Not exactly these," Kipling replied. "Specifications from your brother, Mister Holmes."
"Not military?" Sherlock asked John.
"Not our military, at least not these ones." John replied. "But they're still SIGs. They're used by some allied forces."
"You do know how to use it, don't you?" Sherlock enquired.
John looked up and rolled his brown eyes very pointedly.
"Yes, Sherlock, I know how to use it. It's still a gun."
Sherlock ignored the sarcasm in favour of answering his phone, which was buzzing gently in his suit jacket pocket. He grinned when he saw the hotel's number displayed on the tiny screen. Apparently the twenty he'd slipped the concierge on the way out had paid off.
"Sherlock Holmes," he answered. He saw all eyes in the room focus on him and grinned when the front desk clerk told him he had a letter waiting that had come in the post not five minutes ago. He thanked her and rung off, pushing himself to his feet.
"Come on, John, Inspector. The game is on."
